Whilst on holiday, staying in a privately owned apartment, the apartment was burgled during the night whilst we slept there. Amongst other things, our wedding rings were stolen. We have annual European travel insurance with Moneysupermarket. On our return we found that the terms and conditions of our policy buried in Section 5, 11b, "loss, destruction, damage or theft of the following property, watches and jewellery (unless as a result of mugging or any form of physical violence to you)."
To me this exclusion seems unreasonable. All the other baggage exclusions seems to be either careless/illegal or specialist equipment related. However, this exclusion seems to imply that one should be wearing jewellery and watch all the time. I'd maintain that this exclusion is very significant and if I'd noticed when I read the term and conditions then I'd have taken a different policy. Do I have grounds for complaint that this exclusion was both buried and in addition is unreasonable?

Why were you not wearing your wedding rings? These are usually one of the things that you do wear all the time surely? Maybe I am wrong. I have been married for 17 years and have only taken my wedding ring off once (when I had my 2nd child as my hands got so swollen it became impossible to wear).

Thanks for the replies.
I'm sure many people wear their rings all the time but equally I'm sure many tack them off at night! Both my wife and I do take them off.

It seems to me like a ridiculous exclusion and therefore I'm hoping it could be deemed unfair/unreasonable. I think that at the very least it should be highlighted on the "important facts" list on either on the policy or the web page where I booked. I'd say that the policy was certainly not fit for purpose.

I think the thing to learn from here is always read the small print. I too was burgled a few years back and my insurance was with a certain company, it was very easy to claim, just paid the excess and had my money within 4 weeks. But there were clauses like this if you read the small print enough.

ANyway have a good read next time, cant see you getting anything though as it was in the contract and you will have agreed or signed.

As has been said it was in the terms & conditions. These are a regular topic of conversation and many complain that they are not fair. You have a choice when you take out the insurance cover. If you do not feel that it is correct then you should either reject the policy and go somewhere else or you should request additional cover. You could possibly take your complaint to the ombudsman -but it depends on the value and the exclusion.
The Insurance Ombudsman is now incorporated into the Financial Ombudsman services according to the website. I would suggest contacting them.Link below:

Bad luck adm. Although I think the insurance company IS being a complete ace hole, unfortunatley I don't think you have a leg to stand on as it was in the small print.

Although one thing we did when my husband lost his wedding ring in the sea (it happened a week to the day and hour after we got married!), as our insurance providers wouldn't cover us for items lost in the sea, we accidently forgot to tell the police and insurance company that it was lost in the sea and accidently said it was lost "walking around".
Of course, when we remembered our error, we informed the police in Blanes and the insurance company and gave them the money back that they sent us.

I do not believe the Ombudsman will be able to assist here. IF the Insurance Company had mis-applied the Terms and Conditions, or unreasonably declined settlement which fell within the Terms and Conditions, or if they invoked something that never appeared in their Terms & Conditions then the Ombudsman will help.

The important thing here is "Terms and Conditions". They have not mis-applied their T&Cs, and they haven't unreasonably refused settlement, and they didn't suddenly find a clause you didn't know about. It was clearly stated in the policy document; you didn't read it when you got it- or if you did, you didn't query what you felt to be unfair - until you needed to claim under the section that had something you feel is unfair.

Everyone needs to understand the Ombudsman is NOT the "People's Champion" - just because you don't like the answer you get to your complaint doesnt mean it's a wrong answer. Only if it IS a wrong answer can the Ombudsman help.

Changes to the laws governing the sale of what is termed "general insurance" came into effect in January. Certain sales of travel insurance are covered by the changes - a sale by a travel agent as a "bolt on" to a holiday sale is, however, not covered by the new rules.

Even if this sale was made after the new regulations came into force, I don't think the exclusion you are concerned about would have to be highlighted in either the Initial Disclosure Document OR the Key Facts Document.

As I have mentioned on previous threads, it always advisable to have either Specified or Unspecified Personal Belongings cover on your household policy. This is all risks cover and covers you in and out of the home. As most travel poliies do not have a very high limit for personal effects and you would be able to claim for the loss on your house policy.

Sancho's right, you can't complain to the Ombudsman about T&Cs that you think are unfair. I looked into making a complaint about unfair terms applied to a critical illness policy and found out that they don't deal with those sorts of issues.

There have been a lot of posts on the forums about insurance problems recently - it's certainly made me think about the policy we have and whether it covers what we think it should or not. I am going to be very careful about who we take our next annual policy out with.

I agree with the comments made by Sancho - Just posted the link for information. If you have a home insurance policy you could possibly try them. When we were on honeymoon many years ago my wife put her Opal ring in the safe wrapped in tissue paper. Of course I thought it was rubbish so threw it. When we got home we made a claim on our policy and explained what happenned and they paid up without any problem. Even though the agent told us we were wasting our time.

Latest Accommodations

Get the best deals!

from our cruise, ski and holiday partners

You can change your email preferences at any time.

Yes, I want to save money by receiving personalised travel emails with awesome deals from Holiday Truths group companies which are hotholidays.co.uk,getrcuising.co.uk and getskiing.co.uk. By subscribing I agree to the Privacy Policy